Imola GP : Bottas strikes back!

Bottas beats Hamilton to take pole at Imola as Verstappen survives Q2 scare to take 3rd

Beating Lewis Hamilton is no easy feat these days, but his Mercedes team mate Valtteri Bottas found a way to do just that at Imola as he took a sensational pole position for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix.

Mercedes in a different league!

The Finn trailed Hamilton by just 0.031s after the first runs, but having topped both opening segments of qualifying, Bottas found the time when it mattered, lighting up the timesheets to take pole by 0.1s.

VALTTERI: "This track is beautiful and it's a great feeling to get pole – I had the shakes afterwards!

"I knew in the last lap I had to risk it and go hard and the car responded. It's a good place to start tomorrow and I'm looking forward it it"#ImolaGP 🇮🇹 #F1 pic.twitter.com/XbxwNiIVpn

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 31, 2020

LEWIS: "Valtteri [Bottas] did a great job, it was a pretty poor lap from myself! These things happen, the track is unbelievable – especially the speed we are going round it"#ImolaGP 🇮🇹 #F1 pic.twitter.com/Z9fVsZaYtx

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 31, 2020

Mercedes were in a class of their own at the historic and picturesque Italian track, with Max Verstappen unable to get within half a second of the silver cars, but fortunate to get to Q3 at all after encountering a power issue in Q2.

MAX: "It wasn't a great qualifying because of the issue, we didn't have a lot of laps. We definitely seemed to struggle a bit but P3 isn't bad"#ImolaGP 🇮🇹 #F1 pic.twitter.com/7rDfyYDZGZ

— Formula 1 (@F1) October 31, 2020

Gasly shines again!

Pierre Gasly, announced at AlphaTauri for 2021 ahead of the weekend, was in scintillating form all afternoon, the Frenchman comfortably in the top four throughout and crossing the line to end up fourth quickest to equal his career best start.

Consistent Ricciardo. Ocon fumbles.

Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo was fifth, his fourth top-five start this season, ahead of Alexander Albon who seemed unhappy with the car, but found a way to at least start inside the top six, albeit it 0.4s adrift of team mate Verstappen.

Charles pushes Ferrari in their home race

Charles Leclerc couldn’t repeat his heroics of the last couple of races, but the Ferrari driver was still a solid seventh with Daniil Kvyat making a rare appearance in Q3 for AlphaTauri.

Average McLaren

The McLarens didn’t have the pace to compete in the final shootout, with Lando Norris edging ahead of team mate Carlos Sainz for only the second time in the last eight races to complete the top 10.

George Russell was impressive again, jumping into Q2. Sebastian Vettel failed to impress. He is having a very dismal season. Racing Point were surprisingly out of touch today. Both Perez and Stroll failed to get into Q3.

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IMOLA GP Quali Classification

Let’s hope that the historic Imola gives us a fascinating race tomorrow despite the narrow track.